


Give Thanks

by LT_Aldo_Raine



Category: Band of Brothers
Genre: Angst, Boys In Love, Canon Compliant, Canonical Character Death, Feelings, Feelings Realization, Fluff and Angst, Haguenau, M/M, Minor Character Death, War, World War II, gene and babe are stressed okay, the slowest of burns
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-23
Updated: 2019-01-23
Packaged: 2019-10-15 04:23:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,257
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17521940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LT_Aldo_Raine/pseuds/LT_Aldo_Raine
Summary: “S’wrong of me, I know that,” Gene’s voice broke the silence. “—but m’glad it wasn’t you.”OR: Jackson dies in Haguenau, Babe doesn't, and Gene is grateful.





	Give Thanks

**Author's Note:**

> I know I've been terribly absent lately. I recently moved to England to start grad school--let's blame my negligence on that, shall we? 
> 
> As always, no disrespect to the real heroes of Easy Co.  
> All my love, hope you enjoy!

_Babe_

When the showers finally arrived in Haguenau, Babe waited his turn like everybody else. The moment he stepped under the showerhead, his entire body slumped, muscles turning to jelly beneath the water, goosebumps raising on his flesh. Though the water was lukewarm, it was hotter than any shower he’d had in the last several months, and the redhead lost track of time underneath the weak stream. Lost himself in the trickle of water. Lost his gaze far beyond the shower tent.

There came a sudden blistering heat to his arm.

The sensation shocked Babe enough to draw him back to the moment, back to his shower. Blinking the water from his eyes, he turned to see Gene staring openly at him. The medic’s hand was wrapped around Babe’s arm, the source of the scorching heat. Gene gave a little squeeze. “Heffron,” the medic murmured, his voice quiet in the noisy din of the pop-up shower station. “Been callin’ yo’ name for five minutes.”

Babe blinked, stupefied. He hadn’t heard him, honest.

Gene motioned the small potato-shaped lump of soap cradled loosely in Babe’s grasp. “You should wash up, Heffron, ya need it.”

Babe blinked again, slowly felt his body coming back to life. Numbly, he held the soap under the showerhead and rubbed in little circles to lather it up. “Sure thing, Doc.” His voice was weak, even to his own ears, but Gene seemed to accept his answer because the shorter man turned under the spray of his own shower, pale shoulders glistening as tiny water droplets sprinkled his sparsely freckled skin.

Babe was frozen—still stuck somewhere between _not there_ and _this thing called reality_ —, gaze hovering over Gene’s thin frame, watching but not entirely seeing. At some point, he bathed. Or he thought he did. Either way, he left the showers and headed back to the house where his platoon was billeted.

The house was tense. Silent save for the occasional ruffle of a uniform or flick of a lighter. No one was eager for the night’s patrol across the river.

Babe, like the rest of second platoon, had thought he would get a rest in Haguenau. He deserved a rest, didn’t he? After Julian. After Bill—and Toye, too. But this war wasn’t about men getting what they deserved. No, Babe didn’t get a break. Neither did Grant, or Ramirez, or Shifty. Even Webster’s ass had made it back for this one.

His hair still wet from the shower, Babe laid down on his bed to wait.

* * *

So, they crossed the river.

Second platoon came back—only Jackson didn’t make it.

* * *

Sometime later, Babe found Gene standing inside the shell of a bombed-out building. The cigarette clutched in the medic’s long, pale fingers shook ever so slightly. Babe watched the bright embers burn, the orange a stark contrast to the black night that enveloped the pair, and he tried not to notice the dry blood beneath Gene’s fingernails.

“S’wrong of me, I know that,” Gene’s voice broke the silence. The medic took a drag on the cigarette. Embers burned. Smoke swirled in the frigid air. “—but m’glad it wasn’t you.”

Gene did not look at him. Instead, he dropped the smoldering cigarette amid the ruins and crossed the rubble heap to the road. As the medic disappeared, Babe thought, _Its wrong, but I’m glad it wasn’t me, too._

 

_Gene_

The night after Jackson died, Gene returned to that dank basement in Haguenau. He’d left the previous evening in haste—angry and upset over the young replacement’s death, guilt-ridden and ashamed at his own relief that certain others had made it back alive—and had carelessly left part of his med kit behind. Retrieving it now, Gene was not entirely surprised to see that the basement was occupied.

“Heffron, what’re you doin’ down here? You should be gettin’ some rest while ya can,” the medic scolded, as was his duty.

The redhead did not look at Gene as he replied, did not remove his gaze from the dark stain on the wooden table. “Can’t sleep.”

“That’s a shame,” Gene murmured. The first time they’d had beds to sleep in since before Thanksgiving, and the soldier couldn’t sleep. Pity. Gene took a few small steps, crossing the chilly basement to where Babe sat against the foundation wall, his back to the cobbled bricks. As Gene scrambled for something to say—some kind words to soothe Babe’s pain, some medical advice to help with the insomnia—the redhead spoke, beating him to it.

“You hear we’re movin’ off the line?” Babe’s voice was hollow—ghostlier, even, than when they were in Bastogne. Gene found that he hated the sound. “Winters said we’re movin’ out today. Can ya fuckin’ believe it?”

Gene licked his lips, felt nauseous as thoughts of Jackson and what could have been instantly bombarded his mind. “Its about goddamn time,” the medic all but growled, a bad taste in his mouth.  

“You’re tellin’ me.” Babe’s words were released as a sigh, and the sound was so soft and so sad that Gene found himself sliding down against the wall to sit next to the boy from South Philly.

The men sat in silence for a spell. Gene knew enough about the redhead to know that Babe would speak when he was ready. He didn’t require tender prompting or prodding. For now, Gene was content to rest his head on the bricks, to close his eyes for just a moment, to allow his body to relax, though his heart was still tensed—always tensed—waiting for a desperate cry of, “ _Medic!”_

Babe’s arm was warm where it pressed into Gene’s own. The medic was grateful for a bit of human contact that didn’t involve blood and pain, and so he leant ever-so-slightly more into the soldier beside him. Seconds later, the redhead’s voice fell gently on his ears.

“Why’d you say it?”

Despite himself, Gene’s stomach tightened into a knot like a fist, and the medic felt his lips purse, his jaw clench. He could deny it, could play dumb. _Whatta ya talkin’ about, Heffron?_ But Gene knew that truth of it would be written in his eyes, on his skin. He would not be a coward today. He wouldn’t lie to Heffron. Licking his lips, Gene’s gaze found the dark stain on the wooden table. Jackson’s face in his mind, guilt twisting his inside. “’Cause it was the truth,” he answered with a frown, before immediately moving to stand, suddenly desperate to escape the basement.

Only, Babe caught the medic’s arm and held him rooted to the spot, turning to peer sternly into the Cajun’s eyes. Their breath mixed in the brisk air between them, and Babe kept his fingers curled around Gene’s forearm. Confusion dotting the man’s brow, he asked, “Why me?”

There was no ire in Babe’s brown eyes, no anger on his lips, in the curve of his cheek—just heaps of confusion, a touch of embarrassment, and the tiniest hint of something like hope. Gene’s frown deepened. He glanced down to the slender fingers clutching his arm. The pale digits contrasted nicely with the olive green of his dirty jacket. “I don’t know,” Gene mumbled, once again unable to meet Babe’s gaze.

Guilt settled like a blanket over Gene’s shoulders. The young medic abruptly felt every ounce of exhaustion in his small body, the tired ache dragging down every bone, every muscle. He slumped against the wall, his eyes fluttering shut, seared by the heat of the man beside him—the press of a hip and leg against his own, the hand on his arm, the breath on his face. “I don’t know, Babe,” he murmured, quietly, almost as if to himself.

The fingers on his arm fell away as Heffron pulled his knees to his chest and wrapped his arms around himself. Opening his eyes just so, Gene studied the sharp outline of Heffron’s nose, his bony elbows, the point of his knitted cap. Dark eyes traced every twitch of the redhead’s eyebrow, every shift of muscle in his jaw, every quiver of his lip, and the medic could taste the turmoil rolling off of the soldier. Gene nudged the taller man with the toe of his boot. “Quit thinkin’ so damn hard.”

Babe glanced at him, quickly. “I just…I’m glad I made it, too, ya know? And how fucked up is that? Julian’s _gone._ Muck and Penk…now, Jackson—and fuck, _Bill_ and Joe, they…” Babe’s expression crumbled as he fought the swelling tears in his eyes. Gene frowned as the redhead hastily wiped at his face with the sleeve of his jacket. “I’m so goddamn relieved it wasn’t me, and how fucked up is that? Bill’s my best goddamn friend, and h-here I am, like a sonofabitch, thankin’ my lucky stars it wasn’t me that got my leg blown clear to hell. A-and I keep thinkin’ about Julian’s ma and how I promised I’d get his stuff back to her, but I didn’t. She won’t eva…not even his dog tags—and I just think, _At least its not my ma._ ”

Wild eyes looked at Gene, urgently. Wide and crazed, Babe’s gaze bore a hole in Gene’s heart as he sobbed, “And what the hell does that say about me, huh?”

Instinctively, Gene’s arm draped over Babe’s shoulders, pulling the redhead solidly into his side. It was awkward and uncomfortable. Babe was significantly taller, and propped against the wall, the position pulled and stretched Gene’s wiry body. But he did it because the soldier—his friend—needed him to. This, Gene thought, wasn’t about duty or the red and white badge on his arm; this was about affection and familiarity and comfort.

The medic removed his helmet with his free hand, let it clatter to the floor carelessly, so that he could press his forehead against Babe’s ear, the wispy, dark strands of his hair tickling the redhead’s skin. His nose to the column of Babe’s throat, Gene told him, “It makes you human, Babe.”

“I feel fuckin’ awful, Gene.” Another sob.

Gene brought his free hand to wrap around Babe’s arms atop the man’s knees. Their hands found one another’s, and wordlessly, thoughtlessly, fingers entwined and squeezed, rough palms sandwiching together.

“M’sorry,” Gene breathed into the taller man’s neck, the heat of his own breath caressing his face.

“The hell do you gotta be sorry for?”

“I shouldn’t a’ said that yesterday. I shoulda—” Gene had been weak. He had slipped, let himself feel too much. He should’ve just kept his mouth shut like always. But back in Bastogne—in that frozen, chaotic world where the pain and snow never seemed to end, splashes of crimson against pearly white—, something had happened to Gene. Some part of him broke. Maybe it was Renee, maybe it was the bitter cold. Either way, some bit deep down inside of Gene had shattered, and on the day that Harry Welsh got injured, there came Babe Heffron—that loud-mouthed, scrawny redhead from South Philly—, hauling Gene out of a foxhole and shoving him toward the fight, unknowingly saving Gene from himself.

Things like chocolate and blue ribbon held a new meaning after that, and Gene couldn’t help it, but goddamn it, he wanted Babe Heffron to make it through that war more than he wanted to breathe.

Gene didn’t realize he was crying until Babe reached up to wipe the wet from his neck with a soft, “Aw, Gene…”

"M’sorry, I am. M’so sorry. I didn’t mean—” He was apologizing for it all. For crying, for caring, for speaking truth to his shameful feelings. But Babe wouldn’t have it. “Shuddup. Ya got nothin’ to be sorry for, ya hear me?” the redhead chided as he untangled his own limbs to wrap his arms around Gene.

And so they held each other, two grown men, two paratroopers, holding on to one another for dear life, crying in a basement.

* * *

Sometime later, after a bit of light dozing and a few more tears, the men emerged from the basement, ready to resume their duties. Lingering in the front room of the Haguenau house, the men righted their rumpled uniforms, donned their helmets, and adjusted their scarves. Gene lifted his gaze to meet Babe’s dark brown eyes as he told the other man, “Whateva comes next, Heffron, ya watch yourself, okay?”

The redhead lips curved just so. “Sure thing, Doc.”

Without ado, Babe pulled Gene into a hug. Enveloped in the taller man’s embrace, Gene closed his eyes and savored the sensation—the warmth, the security, the affection. Lips pressed to Gene’s temple as Babe spoke. “You take care of yourself, too, alright, Gene? You matter to folks, too, ya know?”

“Yeah, sure.” Gene nodded, habitually, against Babe’s shoulder. The other man pulled back a hair, just enough to grip the medic’s upper arms. The redhead looked at the Cajun with a sudden ferocity, “I’m fuckin’ serious, Gene. You gotta survive this thing, too. I ain’t—I can’t—” Babe gave a frustrated huff and rested his forehead against the shorter man’s. “Just promise me. Promise you’ll make it out. _We’ll_ make it out, togetha.”

When Gene licked his lips, he could almost taste Babe’s mouth against his. Eyes shut, he clenched his fists in Babe’s jacket and breathed the other man in. He vowed, solemnly, “I’ll try my best, Babe.”

And he did. They both did. Weeks and months later, Gene and Babe made it out of the war, together.


End file.
